This year will mark my third year journeying to the desert southwest from the Mitten State for the Traditions in Western Herbalism Conference. While only a few days long, the past two Traditions gatherings have played a pretty significant role in developing my confidence in growing as an herbalist. At the core it has helped me connect with the network of people committed to moving our relationship with the soil, the plants and with each other to a deeper level.

I am not by nature a dry, desert southwest person. I am a water person — a woman brought up in sailboats, on the water, on the beach. I do love a good warm summer; but constitutionally, hot and dry aggravates me in excess. Add wind, well, then I am a crumbling mess to blow away on the breeze.

Despite my mermaid proclivities, and much to my own amusement, I have fallen in love with the beguiling power and mystique of the desert Southwest. I am certainly not the first one to declare my enchantment for this place —  the desert, but the mountains, forests, canyons.

When I first acknowledged in my heart that my calling was to be an herbalist; my husband gave me Michael Moore’s classic, “Medicinal Plants of the Desert and Canyon West.” The book was his own personal copy, a relic of his childhood spent studying plants and traveling in the desert southwest, among the canyon lands and mountains. That gift, for many reasons, was very special to me and no matter that I am a girl of the Mitten, Moore’s enjoyable book remains as one of my most treasured.

Not long after my husband gifted me Moore’s book, Moore’s book in tow, I travelled to the mesas of New Mexico to attend the first Traditions at the Ghost Ranch. I found the spirits of the mesas calling to me, infusing my psyche with their ancient advice and encouragement. I left the first gathering with my heart expanded and with a sense of anticipation and uncertainty not knowing how my practice would unfold.

I returned home, a year passed. In that time, I launched my herbal CSA and actively began teaching in my community and continued learning from the plants and my teachers.

The second Traditions rolled around and I returned to the Ghost Ranch. This time only to be called to my knees (literally) by the ancients to pay attention to my intentions and question my own strength and motivations.

I fortunately was surrounded by caring souls who I realized I could show my weakness to — dear kindred spirits that had my back and let me collapse, and helped me back on my feet.

Upon returning to my home, I continued to be challenged on the physical level, with a winter spent recovering from knee surgery.   In the time span of nursing an injury, I continued to teach, contemplate more, and rest. Learnings came from paying attention, giving the time to healing as needed when recovering from a surgery. I actively worked to feed and strengthen my body. Pace has and continues to be an issue, and I still have to be mindful not too take on too much or push to hard.

And now, it is time to return to the southwest for traditions for a third time — to Arizona to the Coconino National Forest and Mormon Lake. Today I find myself comfortable in where I am as an herbalist — comfortable in what I know and comfortable not knowing as much as the herbalists more experienced than I. But at the same time, believing that I have something to contribute, something of value as part of growing this resurgence.

Traveling to Traditions with Children in Tow

One of my intentions this year while recovering from my knee injury was to contemplate what sort of practice I wanted to shape — what my practice would be like for my clients relative to my community’s needs and how it would fit into my own lifestyle given that I have children to care for as the primary hearth-tender at home.  Now, many of you that personally know me know that I am not the kind of mom for whom being a mommy comes easily. If left to my own devise, I could work on projects and plan and scheme for 14+ hours or more a day — I get my energy from my work (Did I say I had a problem with pacing myself?).

I will be honest — I was frustrated when I had to consider changing my travel plans considerably to accommodate my home schedule (husband’s travel, blah blah blah). Then, the clouds parted and it was suggested by a friend (Thanks, Gina!!!) to just bring my kids! And thanks-be to the patron saints of travel, so far arrangement-making has been relatively headache free. Needless to say, I am NOT driving the 29 hour trip to schlepp my kids to Arizona (Thanks, Rebecca!!!).

Of course the kids’ immediate response was, “Yay — no school!”  But also, much to my surprise was, “Wow — 7Song has a plant walk for kids,” and “I can’t wait to see Rebecca McTrouble!” Even, “I can’t wait to heal people at my first aid class.” {All giggles on my end}

They excitedly read through the classes for the weekend, marking their names to the classes they wanted to attend. I was delighted to see them excited about taking a kids herbal first aid class and Jacob even saying he wanted to go to all the kids classes and even sit in on 7Song’s Street Medic class.  Emma picked up on Jacob’s excitement at wanting to go to all the classes — “as long as there are crafts,” she said.

I am really grateful to the organizers — particularly to Kiva Rose, Katja Swift and to Kristine Brown — who have made it a priority to create programs for kids so they can be involved in the resurgence of herbal medicine.  Because of their really great advice about shaping a good experience at Traditions with kids in tow; I plan to set aside my own agenda (dammit — how I really, really, really want to sit through all of the great classes on the agenda and absorb!!) and shape our experience by letting my kids discover, inquire, make friends, get outside and just be.

For me, finding good flow and a reasonable pace has always been challenging. Aligning my life and work to the seasons has allowed me to shift and flow with not only the cycles of nature, but of the days, and minutes and hours and the curveballs that get handed to me all the time. Respecting the need to shift and be flexible is difficult for me; but helps me just “go with it”  so even with this upcoming weekend with other herbalists, I can flow into this space with my children in tow and integrate them into the tribe of herbalists I love and admire so dearly.

And now, with what at first I saw as a tremendous barrier, I now see as an exciting opportunity to introduce my children into my tribe of herbalist folk and hope they too feel they are part of the next generation of herbalists. Because they are.